COMPOSERS: Handel
LABELS: Virgin
ALBUM TITLE: Handel
WORKS: Fernando, rè di Castiglia
PERFORMER: Lawrence Zazzo, Veronica Cangemi, Marianne Pizzolato, Max Emmanuel Cencic, Filippo Adami, Antonio Abete, Neal Banerjee; Il Complesso Barocco/Alan Curtis
CATALOGUE NO: 365 4832
The background history to Handel’s
Fernando, rè di Castiglia is both
interesting and puzzling. Handel
completed the score early in 1732
and it was performed a few days
later under its title Sosarme. But he
had begun to write the opera to an
entirely different libretto by Antonio
Salvi and, indeed had completed two
of its three Acts before abandoning
a setting in Portugal during the
Middle Ages for an adaptation of
one set in Sardis in Asia Minor in
the time of the Medes and Persians.
The only character common to
both texts is the bass, Altomaro, the
villain of the piece, for whom Handel
nevertheless wrote some of the most
beautiful music in the opera. While
the reason for these sudden changes
in Handel’s plans remains in doubt,
Winton Dean and others since have cited political considerations rather
than any necessity Handel might
have felt for structural adjustment.
Alan Curtis is a seasoned
Handelian who has contributed,
perhaps more than anyone now, to
the composer’s operas on disc. His
decision to breathe new life into a
known opera’s original incarnation
is much more than an academic
exercise and is especially rewarding
both in respect of the relationship
between words and music and in
the reinstatement of recitative,
accompanied and unaccompanied
which Handel omitted from
Sosarme. If the libretto is not of the
best then the same cannot be said
of Handel’s music which offers a
veritable banquet. Among the many
captivating numbers are Altomaro’s
‘Fra l’ombre gli orrori’ (Act I),
which Handel adapted from his
much earlier dramatic cantata, ‘Aci,
Galatea e Polifemo’, Elvida’s A major
‘Vola l’augello’ which concludes
Act II, the duet ‘Tu caro, caro sei’
for the lovers Elvida and Fernando,
and the unusually extended, richly
modulating finale of the opera which
follows. The cast of singers is always
effective though seldom, perhaps
outstanding and the instrumentalists
in all but one or two instances
unanimous and sympathetic. Curtis
directs all with stylistic assurance. Nicholas Anderson